North Carolina made the short drive over to Cameron Indoor Stadium to face Duke and close out the regular season just 40 days ago.
Forty Days Ago. It seems like so much longer than that.
Heading in, the Tar Heels were riding a three-game win streak and appeared to have finally found something after a deluge of injuries, buzzer-beating losses and a season filled with utter strangeness over the prior four months.
At the time, most people thought “pandemic” was a condition and not a description of a spread. At the time, most UNC fans wondered if the Tar Heels could notch a W over the Blue Devils and charge into the ACC Tournament as a dangerous second-tier favorite to cut down the nets.
“Could they make a run and get to the dance,” so many wondered.
Man, does that seem like forever ago.
In the time since, the Tar Heels’ season ended four days later in their worst performance of the season, perhaps a day after their best of the campaign. But none of that had any time to resonate, as the sports landscape and nation changed that week.
The ACC shut down its tournament, thus in a bizarre twist of fate, UNC played in the final game of the year despite its ugly 14-19 final record. But who remembers, and in many respects, who cares?
Forty days ago, everything seemed normal. I arrived at Cameron three hours before tipoff because, well, that’s what I’ve done for years for UNC-Duke games in the regular season. Been doing it since the 90s.
I went through my usual routine, though rather elongated because my typical arrival for most other games is two hours before the kickoff or tipoff (Final Fours notwithstanding). Life was normal aside from the fact I was covering the second losingest Carolina club ever but one that had suddenly caught fire and had plenty of its fans into thinking an upset was possible that evening.
New routines have been the mandate for everyone since. Who the heck knew what Zoom was at the time, now we’re doing our podcasts on it at THI and meeting with UNC football coaches and players on it every week. Even Ol’ Roy recently hopped on.
“Social distancing” is a term now. Who doesn’t now know what “mitigation” means? Masks? The only masks I’ve ever worn were on Halloween as a kid (Batman and the Jolly Green Giant, if you must know) and during eight years of playing football.
And, as I reel this back into our purpose here at THI, we sit in holding pattern not having a clue about the immediate future of what we do for a living and what drives so many of your passions. No matter who our colleagues cover, be it LSU, Oregon, Michigan State, Idaho, Albany, Catawba or UNC, nobody has any idea of what’s to come over these next four-plus months.
We may have a season to cover and we may not. The effects of not having one is something I’d rather not consider right now, as it would be devastating from an athletics sense to schools around the nation and send many of us who cover them to the unemployment line.
Orlando on September 4 always seemed like a cool idea. That’s when Carolina visits Central Florida, in case you were wondering. Now, it’s hard to fathom happening but at the same time still difficult to imagine it won’t.
Such is life in limbo. We’re not alone, though, this is our tale.
Forty days ago, most everything seemed right and normal. Now, nobody has a clue.
